It’s no secret that Fox has been looking at the Marvel Cinematic Universe at something it would like to emulate. Now, it seems as if the seeds might be getting sown for something of an expansion to Fox’s X-Men movie-verse, with the announcement that The Fault In Our Stars director Josh Boone will helm the New Mutants spinoff movie.

With X-Men: Apocalypse and Deadpool due out next year, a Channing Tatum-starring Gambit movie mooted and an X-Force film proposed at one point (who knows what the state of play with that is now?), it’s certainly a statement of intent from Fox about the direction they’re heading in.

The original New Mutants team saw the likes of Cannonball, Sunspot, Wolfsbane, Karma and Cypher take centre stage. Of those, only Sunspot has shown up so far in the Fox X-Men movies (played by Adan Canto in X-Men: Days Of Future Past), but judging by Marvel’s track record so far when it comes to populating their X-teams, expect the roster to comprise a mixture of old and new faces. Younger characters like Jubilee (to be played by Lana Condor in X-Men Apocalypse) are likely candidates. Maybe we’ll even see younger versions of Bishop, Blink etc from Days Of Future Past?

Speaking about the film, producer Simon Kinberg said: “We’re so excited to explore this new part of the X-Men universe, and so excited to do it with Josh, who is uniquely suited to tell this story about young characters.”

Along with Kinberg and Boone, Knate Gwaltney (Jackass 3D) will co-write with Boone, with Lauren Schuler Donner also on board as producer.

X-Men: Apocalypse will be released in cinemas on 19 May 2016. For more on the biggest superhero movies, pick up the latest issue of SciFiNow.